Poop to Power

What’s a dog owner to do? You have to walk your dog, and your dog has to poop. Do you just scoop up the waste and throw it in the trash? What if there were a useful way to recycle dog poop? Guess what? There is!

News You Can Use

It was first developed in India and China to take advantage of livestock waste. It’s a device called a methane digester. What it actually digests is poop. Inside the digester, animal waste is used to produce methane gas.

Methane is a simple hydrocarbon that is the chief ingredient in natural gas. Like natural gas, methane can be burned to produce heat and light.

Credit: Project Morpheus

Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/morpheuslander/5601157189/

License: CC BY-NC 3.0

Liquid methane can be used with liquid oxygen as rocket fuel for specialized propulsion systems
[Figure2]

Recently, an inventive artist from Boston, Massachusetts, devised a methane digester for a different type of waste: dog poop at a local dog park. The methane is burned in a street lamp that provides light in the park. You can get an introduction to the project by watching this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBaGXXG_A_4

What Do You Think?

At the links below, learn more about using dog poop to produce useful methane. Be sure to read the “How It Works” page at the first Web site. Then answer the following questions.